Filippo Ledda

Miliar

The piece reflects the COVID-19 period. "Lockdown" evokes isolation and the hope for better times. "Resilience" celebrates musicians' strength in overcoming difficulties positively. The final "Milestone" honors musical bands as pillars of communities.

The COVID-19 pandemic, in addition to causing a health emergency all over the planet, has had a destabilizing social impact, even in the most economically advanced countries. Work forces, education, sport, and culture have paid the price. In Italy, social activities have entered an unprecedented crisis. Not even wind bands have been spared as they have been forced to suspend all activities for a long time. Yet, when the worst was over, members of many associations rolled up their sleeves and tried to rebuild what they had previously done, making up for lost time and projecting themselves proactively into the future. MILIAR describes in music one of the most critical and dramatic periods of the last decades without emphasizing its tragedy and using, by contrast, a light and dynamic language, as if to exorcise the obstacles that had to be overcome in that difficult situation. The piece is divided into two main sections, which follow one another seamlessly. The first section, "Lockdown", evokes the months of isolation and the following time in which the measures to contain the virus did not allow wind bands to rehearse with the usual regularity. The core part of this section is the "Fanfare of Hope", which symbolizes the confidence, if not almost the certainty, that better times would come, a hope that has never faded, not even in the darkest moments.The second section, "Resilience", portrays the reaction of amateur musicians who, despite the difficulties, have managed against all odds to overcome a difficult and controversial historical period in a positive and constructive way. The finale, "Milestone", is a celebration of the wind bands that in some contexts, especially in smaller communities, have turned out to be real "milestones": veritable points of reference to which the citizenry has anchored itself to rise from the ashes and to plan a bright tomorrow.